Peter May - The Firemaker

She sat listening in silence. ‘I hadn’t thought through the planning that must have gone into it. Not in that kind of detail. In my job you are so preoccupied with the details of death that you don’t think much about motivation, or premeditation.’ She fell silent again, thinking about it some more. ‘It’s extraordinary, when you examine it. Why would somebody go to such lengths? I mean, it wasn’t even as though it was a particularly convincing suicide.’ She turned it over again in her mind. ‘Are you sure these three killings are connected?’

‘No, I am not sure.’

‘I mean, they were all professionally executed, but the other two were simple, uncomplicated, almost casual. Chao Heng’s killing was… bizarre and ritualistic and, if you are right in your assumptions, minutely plotted and planned.’ She turned to look at him. ‘You’ve eliminated a drugs connection, right?’ He nodded. ‘So all that’s left to connect them are the cigarette ends.’ He nodded again. ‘And, God knows, that’s pretty damned weird.’ She frowned. ‘Something not right. Something really not right.’ And for a fleeting moment she understood his obsession, was touched by a feeling both ephemeral and elusive, which he might have called instinct. A feeling that left her uneasy and uncertain, but intrigued. ‘Tell me about Chao Heng.’

As he drove along Chang’an Avenue, he recapped for her the details from the file he had been given on Chao Heng. ‘Retired due to ill health?’ she mused. ‘What was wrong with him?’

‘I’ve no idea. His bathroom cabinet was full of medicines.’ He turned into Zhengyi Road and parked in the street outside the police apartments. ‘I’ll be five minutes,’ he said.

She watched him go, noticing for the first time how narrow his hips were in contrast to his broad shoulders, the pleasing square set of his head. She knew he was fit from the way he moved, muscles toned and taut. A man’s body was usually the last thing she found attractive. Normally it was the eyes that would first appeal. Windows on the soul. You could tell so much about someone’s personality from the eyes; their humour, warmth, or the lack of either. She liked a man to be cerebral, to have a sense of humour. Masculinity was important, but ‘macho’ was a turn-off. Li was moody and defensive and prickly, but there was something in his eyes that told her she would like him if only she could get near him. There was no doubting his masculinity, but he had a sensitive — perhaps over-sensitive — quality, betrayed by the ease with which he blushed. No doubt it embarrassed him, but she found it endearing. His guilt, when she had caught him looking at her reflection in the mirror, had been amusing. But for a long moment it had been more, a strange feeling of desire flipping over in her stomach. That feeling returned now, and she felt herself grow hot and flushed. She drew a deep breath and closed her eyes. This was not going to happen. She had not escaped from Chicago, from the person she had been, the life she had left in ruins, just to fall for some damned Chinese policeman with a chip on his shoulder and a severe case of xenophobia.

She forced herself to focus on the murders, recreating in her mind the picture of Chao’s apartment that Li had painted for her. If Chao was the key to the three murders, then there must be clues in his life and lifestyle, in his work, his apartment. But her thoughts were interrupted by the opening of the driver’s door. Li was wearing a fresh white short-sleeved shirt open at the neck, and neatly pressed black trousers over gleaming brown shoes. ‘Very smart,’ she said. ‘Who does your ironing for you? Your uncle?’

‘I do it myself,’ he said, and blushed, covering his embarrassment by making a meal of pulling on his seat belt and starting the engine. Margaret looked at him with mixed feelings. In the last couple of hours he had taken her through the entire emotional spectrum, from anger verging on hatred to stirrings of lust and affection. He was an infuriating man.

The headquarters of Section One were still besieged by people who had been summoned to make statements. The offices and hallways of the building were baking in the afternoon heat. Corridors were lined with people on chairs, or squatting with their backs to the wall. Cigarette smoke hung heavy in the still air, in long horizontal strands, like mist. Officers and interviewees alike were crotchety and tired. Even the cheap standard-issue stationery slipped into typewriters by secretaries had gone limp. The temperature rose as Li and Margaret climbed the stairs to the top floor, and by the time they had reached the detectives’ office Li’s shirt was sticking to him in a tapering line down his back, turned sheer by perspiration. Margaret could see clearly the sculptured lines of muscle interwoven across his shoulders and upper back. She knew the names of every one, memorised during hours spent studying for anatomy exams: trapezius, hood, latissimus dorsi, erector spinae . She knew the way they were layered and overlapped, and what they looked like beneath the skin. She had never regarded them as anything other than anatomical. Until now. There was something animal, sexual and attractive, about the way they pressed against the wet, semi-transparent cotton of Li’s shirt. She cursed herself under her breath. What in God’s name was happening to her? She forced her eyes away.

Li’s heart sank as he turned into the detectives’ room and saw heads lift and faces light in expectation. The door to his office stood ajar, and beyond it the room seemed to glow, as if filled with sunlight, and yet his windows, he knew, faced north-east and only caught the sun obliquely in the early morning. Necks craned to catch his expression as he pushed the door open. His office was unrecognisable. All the furniture had been moved. A large fish tank filled with golden carp stood on a table in one corner. Flowers bloomed in pots all along the windowsill. A small tree in a porcelain pot spread large fleshy leaves into the office from another corner. His desk now faced the door, side-on to the window on its left. The filing cabinet that had stood behind the door had been moved to the far corner. The floor was covered with paint-spattered blankets, and a painter in overalls stood on a stepladder spreading bright yellow paint over cream walls that had gone grey with age and smoke. The previously jammed window stood wide open — no doubt, Li thought furiously, to let the paint fumes escape.

The feng shui man from the previous day was sitting cross-legged again among the files on Li’s desk, examining a large sheet of paper held open in front of him. He looked up at Li and smiled. ‘ Much better. You like it?’ He held out the sheet of paper. ‘My plan. Ve-ery good feng shui .’ He smiled at the walls. ‘Yellow. The colour of the sun. The colour of life. This will uplift your spirit and stimulate your ch’i . You feel good, you work better.’ He grinned, revealing his bad teeth. ‘Your men are very good. They move furniture ve-ery quickly.’

Li was incredulous. ‘You used my detectives to move the furniture?’ Behind him, he heard the unrestrained mirth of his detectives. He looked at the fish tank, and the array of plants. ‘Who’s paying for all this?’

‘Your uncle tells me, spare no expense. I think he is very fond of you.’

Li grew hot with anger. He looked at the painter, who was listening in with interest. ‘You,’ he said. ‘Out.’

‘But I haven’t finished yet,’ the painter protested.

‘I don’t care. Get your blankets off my floor, take your paint and your ladders, and go. This is a working office, and I am in the middle of a murder investigation.’